At the risk of opening myself up to a lot of criticism... could I ask the forum for customer service advice?

Here's the situation.

We had an international customer order 12 yards of a particular fabric (which we did have). For international shipping, it costs less to ship to flat-rate envelopes than it does to send it all together in one package. By a lot, actually: $43 versus $27.

So we e-mailed her to ask if she would prefer us to ship it all in one piece for an additional $16.

After a week had gone by with no reply, we e-mailed her again, asking the same question, and stating that if we did not hear from her in a couple more days, we would choose the less expensive option and send it as 6 yards each in two envelopes.

Now that she's received both packages, she is upset with us for having sent it in two pieces, plus she's upset for having to pay import fees on two packages instead of one.

Additional pertinent information:
- we *did* have (and use) her correct e-mail address
- for international orders our shopping cart calculates shipping based upon the number of flat-rate envelopes needed to hold the yardage purchased
- it's not possible for us to know what each country charges in the way of import fees and taxes (though we do keep up on this for England and Canada because we have lots of customers there)

What do you think? How should we have handled this? What could we have done better?

I think you handled the situation in a professional way. The lady didn't get back to you as to how she wanted you to send her order so therefore it's her fault not yours. You did everything a business person could do. If she wanted it done different maybe she should have replied to the email you sent with the shipping information.

I would not have shipped until I had confirmation as people can use "didnt receive correspondence" as an excuse to be unhappy.

You can't please everybody all the time. You did your best to contact her.

I think you handled it correctly. But you've probably lost a customer but not because of anything you did wrong. She should have responded to your email.

Wow this is a tough one because my two immediate thoughts go like this:

thanks for saving me money

I wanted 12 yards and you cut it without knowing how I wanted to use the material

But you were still in a tough spot with her because you did try to contact her and she wasn't responding but would have likely sent you an angry email for taking forever to send her the material had you just waited for a response.

You are a business and can't leave orders open eternally.

Hmmph......stumped :)

I think you did everything you could on yourside. (Was she given options when she placed her order? Usually websites have you pick how you want it shipped.) Regardless you did try to contact her twice about it. Stop beating yourself up.
I would send her a coupon for a certain % off her next purchase and leave it at that. If she orders again, do not ship it until you know how she wants it sent.
I just visited your online site and found your winter fabrics spectacular!

We would never send a single cut as two pieces unless specifically requested to do so. You don't know what the customer has in mind for the fabric. I've had customers that just wanted to use a long piece for bunting or draping and didn't care what it cost, to buy or to ship.

I don't know how your cart estimates shipping charges, but if it does and if the customer has accepted the estimate, that means they're willing to pay the charges. Trying to save the customer a few bucks on shipping is a noble effort, but not always necessary or even desirable.

We also won't overpack flat rate envelopes, the PO has every right to refuse them, or to send them back.

With hind-sight being 20-20 -

The only real suggestion I have would have been to just have held the fabric for the customer until she* responded.

She may have been in the hospital or something -

Did you have any phone numbers or other way of contacting her?

*"she" is being used generically here - as a substitute for "he/company/business/etc.")

I prefer to get a long length uncut.

maybe that second email should have been...we will hold this order until we hear from you due to all of the expenses involved with overseas shipments; maybe that would have attracted her attention enough to respond in the first place. i would not have shipped it without verifying. the extra import charges were probably more than the $16 savings, but she should have responded. you can set up email accounts to see if the recipient actually read the email or not, she could have been out of town or something and never saw them. i would have waited until i heard from her. i have received emails from on-line shops in the past telling me about a shortage or something, and they tell me we will hold your order until we hear from you; your order will be cancelled if no reply within 72 hours. if she had not seen the emails, when her order did not arrive i bet she would have been getting in touch with you. dealing with international shipping is always an 'issue'. between just the cost but then they add customs charges and if you do not put the right (thing) in the customs slip about what it is it can really cost. when i was shipping stuff i always put (gift) on the customs slip...that did not cost people so much when they went to pick up their package. we learned this doing a round robin program.
anyway. sorry she is mad, lesson learned on all sides. :(

Sounds like you did the fair thing. Without a response from her, you used your best judgement with the information available. Life is tooo short. Let it go. (I sure hope she is not trying to get you to lower the price.)

Shipping merchandise as "gift" is a huge violation of international customs laws and can subject your business to large fines, seizures of the property, continued opening and examination of your shipments, etc.

I wouldn't risk it...

can't really add anything more to what everyone else said, but checked out your site...it's organized beautifully! love the themes section, love the options. methinks this one customer and your desire to do good to your other customers will keep you in buisness quite awhile...ps love the panels...the choices are inspiring...now i need money!!!

It was ten days from when she placed her order to when we shipped it. We don't like to "hold" fabrics more than a week, figuring that a week generally is plenty of time in which to reply. (How long is long enough to wait? Another good question.)

Though... we do hold partial orders longer for international customers if we're waiting for a backordered item to come in... *and* if we've been in contact with the customer so they know what to expect.

I, too, would generally prefer to receive the fabric all in one length. And I would have thought that's also what most of our customers would want. But in the vast majority of cases where we've asked what the (international) customer prefers, they say that they'd rather have the less expensive flat-rate envelopes, and they tell us what lengths to cut the fabric according to how they plan to use it.

I would also have thought that our international customers would *always* want to fill up the envelope to capacity, but have found that customers in certain countries always keep it below a certain value, to avoid/lessen the fees.

THANK YOU for posting this. It's an ethically muddy area with rules that people are tempted to "stretch", not knowing what the impact to all parties is.

I have problems like this everyday. I head the email "URGENT,shipment on hold" That gets their attention. I have clients that have meetings overseas, wait until 4 days before they leave and then want me to make the signs and ship to arrive for their meetings. 4 Signs cost $160.00, shipping overnight to Berlin, Germany 290.00. Should I or shouldn't I? I did and he had a heart attack with the price. You have to do what you have to do. He contracted me to do his signs and have them there by a given time. I did it and he finally paid.

You can't please all the people all the time but you can please some people some of the time. You paid attention and did you best; all you can do and you did "good".

I would probably have said in the email, if we don't hear from you within "X amount of days" we will ship as stated in your original order.

After I place an order, I may be gone on vacation/called away to a family emergency or I am periodically displaced due to flooding, and not have access to the internet/computer.

So if I didn't respond to the email, I would expect there to be no changes to my order, unless what I wanted wasn't available. If I found out after I returned, that it could have been shipped cheaper? I might have been disappointed in not being able to answer the email, but I wouldn't take it out on you though. :D:D:D

DITTO
I buy a lot of stuff from US and know about USPS env and what will go into them, had to find this out wasn't told ------YOU laid everything out so she has NO redress, don't stand for it!!!

"Displaced due to flooding"?

Amma, is that why you're always "out searching for some sunshine"?

I think you did the best you could.
Trying to contact them and no response back after waiting a certain number of days. You did what you thought was best.
If you lost that person as a customer, oh well....you still have the rest of us. :)

Amma is ALWAYS flooded. lol

I think you handled this very professionally.

I agree with several others that you should maybe have said in the correspondance (that they ignored!) that you would not ship until you heard from them.

Import taxes at thier end is totally there problem!

I can see you were between a rock and a hard place on this one!!

Leasons learned I guess.....

Something good that you can take from this.... you might offer a check button for this option. I would want the cheaper shipping unless of course I needed that 12 yds. whole.lol :-)

You know, I'm not so sure that people know what to do with checkbox options.

We already have one that allows the customer to specify what to do if our inventory comes up short:
- send what there is
- backorder the item (default)
- cancel the item
- contact the customer.
We're grateful when a savvy customer picks something other than the default option. While I *thought* that having this checkbox option available would allow the customer to automatically answer all questions about what do (and save us time), in the end if we come up short, we still always contact the customer. 'Cause we've found out that most of them really didn't mean to have the default checked and they don't understand that they have the ability to specify what they want us to do.

:|

We try, honestly we do... !

Write the subject of the email to get their attention. I would have sent one that said : Hey you want this fabric or not?

I guess it's good I don't have a business that caters to the public. :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I don't know what would have been the best for you to do, but I thank you for posting this here because I am a potential customer of any 'shop' on this board, and live overseas. This has made me more aware of the possible problems and how to avoid them, with the owners help. Thank you again.

What a way to learn.

Now, perhaps you will include a cautionary note on shipping, as to the need to know how to ship if a large amount and to contact customer service.

I would have done what you did ... but would have included copies of the e-mails sent to the customer.

ali

The thoughts I had while reading your post question. I do not want to read the responses until after I have made mine. In my response please do not think I am being gruff.
Customs has a dim view of one recipient and/or address receiving multiple shipments from the same sender and/or address shipped on the same date. If you arouse customs suspisions each shipment the sender sends into that country may be held for inspection until the suspisions go away. In the same turn, all shipments for that recipient may be held for inspection until any suspisions go away.
Some quilters use wholecloth. Seems like cutting the fabric in half could result in a problem in the layout of the quilt.
If you only ship in flat rate envelopes your shopping cart should note it's limitation of xx weight and/or xx yards.
If you offer the option of shipping total yardage in a larger box the shopping card should so note with emphasis on the 'additional shipping charges'.

I think that you were very kind and professional, but I'd have been upset if it were cut without additional yardage in compensation (such as from two different bolts). As long as she paid shipping, I"d have just done it her way, especially since she didn't respond. There are many times I"m away from a computer and want my pkg there when I get home.

Is this customer generally "reasonable"?

If yes, then maybe some kind of gift certificate or "deal" on the next order?

It probably would not be practical for the customer to return it for a refund.

If no, then send a letter explaining what you told the QB along with copies of the e-mails that were not responded to.

I agree with you. I would not have sent it without their reply to my emails.

I hope you don't feel too beat up by all of these posts. I think this is one of those times when waiting for her reply would have been best. Lesson learned.

I would have sent the email but given them a deadline after which I would send it in one piece at the higher rate. I figure that once it's cut, the customer can't put it back together. So unless they tell me to cut it to save money, I send it whole and charge them.

But you were trying to save them $$ and that's pretty nice. Don't beat yourself up over this.

This was a lose-lose situation for you. Regardless of your decision, she would not have been happy with it.

Personally, I would not have not been upset that you had saved me $$$.

Only suggestion that I can think of is to ask for a phone # in the checkout process. Many places ask for this. If you had had it you could have called. I know that an international call could have been a little expensive, but ultimately you would have had a happy customer and not held the order open for weeks.

I would not have cut the fabric, and waited as long as it took for a response from the buyer.
It was a tough call, and am sorry you had to be put in that position. Gives everyone something to think about when selling. Know that you did what you thought was best at the time.

I would have stated in the e-mail we would hold shipment until further notice and not done anything until hearing from the customer. If that means holding the fabric for one week more, then by all means I would have made the exception to the rule.

I second this.. How do you know that she had computer access to reply/respond to you, she could of even been on holiday..

I too would have been upset if I ordered a lot of yardage, and it was cut without my consent. If you cut it at 6 yds each, and what I needed was 7 yds and 5 yds, then one piece would have been unusable.

I beleive you should make a section on your webpage, that international customers need to read and agree to by check box before they can finish the checkout process, that states, how much you can get in your flat rate envelopes, and if they order more than what fits in there, the shipping will be different than your shopping carts charges, and you won't ship until they have responded to emails about the additional charges for shipping. Once you know how much they are ordering, and how much it would weigh and cost in additional postage, email them, and give them 72 hours to respond. If they don't respond then cancel the order. If this is all spelled out on your webpage, and they have to read and agree before placing the order, then they can't argue with you if the order is cancelled because they didn't respond.

I agree that things come up and people may not have internet access, but that isn't the businesses fault, it is the customers fault. You can't hold a business responsible for someones internet access. I beleive it would be better to cancel the order, and let the customer know why, and if they really wanted the fabric, they can order it again, knowing that they are going to have to approve additional postage charges before the order will be filled and shipped.

As long as you state these things on your website for international shipping, then the customer becomes responsible for making sure they reply to any email informing them of additional charges. While this may not help with the customer that this happened to, you can take steps to make sure it won't happen with future customers.

We had already held the fabric for ten days before we shipped it. Could we have held it longer? Sure... but... to be practical, a shop really can't hold it indefinitely. I can't imagine that if I ordered merchandise from, say, target.com, that they'd hold it very long if there was a question about the order and I was unreachable to provide an answer.

When I responded to the customer today, I did let her know the text and dates of the e-mails we sent her. We keep records of all correspondence right in our customers' sales orders, so that no matter which one of us (in the shop) answers a customer's phone call or e-mail, we know any and all information that has flowed back and forth.

Now I'm wondering if you (the forum readers) think it would have been better had we just canceled the order entirely, having not heard from the customer. (Yes, she could have been ill or on vacation or had a broken computer but ... we're not psychic and just can't know these things.)

Thoughts?

Make it right with her. Offer her a replacement. Offer her a big discount on her next order. Do what it takes. It's easier to please one customer than to have her tell everyone she knows to NOT order from you.